While electric power from traditional electrical power grids is readily available in many locations throughout the world, there remain vast regions where no electric power is available. Even in locations where electric power is available, there is a variety of situations where a supplemental or substitute power source would be desirable.
Solar and wind power generation systems are known and may be applied in many different applications. Traditional solar and wind power generation systems, however, have several shortcomings. For example, these systems generally have not been standardized. As a result, they must be custom built for each particular application and/or at each desired site, which makes these systems expensive. Custom built solar and wind power systems typically require days to assemble or disassemble. Further, traditional solar and wind power systems are not modular. Specifically, once a particular solar or wind power generator system has been designed and manufactured to include a certain number of power generating devices (such as photovoltaic or wind turbine devices), additional devices may not be added to the system without significant difficulty including, for example redesign and modification of the power system and/or redesign and modification of the power generation system site.
Additionally, conventional power generating systems generally are not designed for efficient transportation to a desired location, and are difficult to disassemble and remove once they have been constructed at the desired location. Many power generating systems are transported in a piecemeal fashion from a number of different manufactures or retailers. The components are then assembled and coupled to preexisting housing structures or to specialized housing structures constructed at the desired location of the power generating system.
Conventional power generation systems also do not provide adequate versatility for receiving power from different types of power generating devices, and for supplying power to a variety of different power receiving devices requiring different types electrical supply. Many power generation systems are designed with a single type of power generating device (such as diesel powered or wind powered generator) supplying power directly to one or more power receiving device. Accordingly, interchanging power receiving devices from the power generating device is difficult or impossible in existing power generating systems.
The present invention provides a power generating system that avoids some or all of the aforesaid shortcomings in the prior art.